President's Day Trip to the East Side, 2004 ------------------------------------------- Friday night: ============= In several waves, we [Steve Andrews, Frank (???), Matthew Seligman, Matthias Seeger & girlfriend Barbara (sp?), Michelle Minikel, Paul German, Chris Tuffley, Mike Scarpulla, Chris LaBonte, and I] set out driving from Berkeley Friday evening for the BLM's free climber's camp near Bishop (see p. 2 of http://www.drtopo.com/califo/owens.pdf). We planned to meet up in camp Saturday morning. To avoid what we presumed would be nightmarish traffic on I - 80 to N. Tahoe and US 50 to S. Tahoe, I recommended most people drive past Kirkwood and Carson Pass: I - 580, I - 205, I - 5 (north), CA 4 (east), CA 99 (north), CA 12 (east), CA 88 (east), US 395 (south). Michelle and Steve tried to slightly beat the rush hour traffic by leaving at 4:30, and it didn't work -- 2+ hours to Tracy! But they did stop by kirkwood for some-late night skate skiing --- sans headlamps! --- near the Meadows. I believe most of us headed out later -- considerably so, in my case! I picked up Tuffley in Davis near 10:00 p.m. Friday, and we got into our tent at 4:00 a.m. Saturday. Saturday: ========= Michelle, Steve, Tuffley, Frank, and Paul promptly found each other, while Scarpulla, LaBonte, Matthias, & Barbara were MIA. We figured they could find their own fun (and perhaps coordinate later with us by cell), and so broke camp and packed to go backcountry skiing, including a battery check on our avi beacons. <-- Pay attention! There's a plot twist coming... We found what looked like a suitable peak for our varied skill levels --- Mt. Morrison (South) --- reached from the Rock Creek trailhead, up the road from Tom's Place. Having only one Sno-Park pass, two of us headed into Bishop, only to find out that Wilson's East Side Sports doesn't sell them! As it happens, Tom's Place does, so we bought a day pass and headed up the road... ...where we ran into Scarpulla and LaBonte breaking camp --- a nice coincidence! They were enthusiastic about joining us, so we headed to the trail head. While we were packing up, Matthias and Barbara pulled up --- yet another nice coincidence! Unfortunately, we realized that two beacons were nowhere to be found, though they'd been in our possession that morning. After wasting an hour ripping apart gear from two cars, Steve headed back to our campsite (c. 1/2 hour each way), suspecting they might've been left back in camp. We dithered a bit more at the trailhead, then set out up the road (the snowboarders on snowshoes, which weren't really necessary given the hard packed snow), for about 3 miles before stopping for a snack. Shortly thereafter, Steve caught up with us. He'd found the beacons --- a big relief as they're worth ~$150 each --- sitting on the ground back at our site. As the day was waning, we abandoned our original Morrison plan and headed toward a gully just above the lake, while Tuffley, Matthias, and Barbara headed on up the road. We decided to take a run just as the sun dipped over the ridge, on some very icy snow. I flailed, but everyone else looked okay. Unfortunately, the best powder --- a couple feet deep --- was on the first 10 meters of elevation gain from the road, over a gentle slope of a hundred meters. So most of us headed up and re-skied that. A few of us resolved that, when getting turns in the backcountry is the goal of a day trip, long horizontal approaches are unacceptable. We all coasted back down to the cars in short order and proceeded to camp at some hot springs near the famous Green Church. This required some fun driving for Matthias and I, as we each had 2WD cars and the roads were rutted and snowy. As expected, the springs were crowded (about 10 other people were arriving as we did), so we cooked and set up camp and then soaked. We timed this well: most folks had left the pool when we arrived, and just as we left yet another large group (~15) showed up. Sunday: ======= Matthias and Barbara soaked before leaving us to drive south and then west and up the coast back to Berkeley. As the rest of us wanted to ice climb, and we thought routes would be in short supply on the holiday weekend, I asked Steve and Michelle to defer for a day and skate ski. They skied all the trails in Mammoth's system in something like three hours, and therefore concluded that the resort's claim of 46 km of trails is vastly overstated. The rest of us headed to June Lake, figuring it to be less crowded than Lee Vining. We met Matt Seligman there. (He'd made the drive from Berkeley that morning in five hours!) Access to the roadside ice near the power plant is officially closed, though climbers were poaching it; we pondered doing so ourselves, then decided we'd be harming access issues by breaking rules, giving ammunition to those who argue that climbers can't be trusted to follow regs. Unfortunately, the other ice --- though it was very much in shape --- looked like it couldn't be top roped, and involved a strenuous approach hike in any event. Consequently, we proceeded to Lee Vining. Just as we got to the climbing area, a few routes opened up as the morning shift headed out. We set up two fun routes, on ice most of us thought was great quality. (Tuffley remarked that LaBonte's repeated exclamations of "NICE!" when placing the tools sounded a lot like "ICE!," the warning for ice fall.) After his first-ever ice climb, Paul decided he likes climbing ice more than rock, and Frank did well on his first climb, never having been on rock or ice. Scarpulla and LaBonte headed back to the Bay, Mike wondering if his flu-like symptoms weren't the beginning of something more ominous -- see http://members.cox.net/jlboone1/Lake_Mead_Area/Goldstrike/Naegleria.htm . Back at camp, we had a great dinner and another good soak. Matt especially enjoyed the drive in on his low-riding Mustang convertible. Monday: ======= Paul and Frank headed off to ski Mammoth before returning to the Bay. Steve, Michelle, and Matt headed back to Lee Vining to climb ice. Unfortunately, it was RAINING when they got there, and climbers coming down said it was raining on the routes, too, though they're higher up. (Such is the fickle nature of cold weather in the Sierra --- which partly explains why some CHAOTs went to Utah this weekend to climb ice there!) So Matt returned to the Bay (no news yet about whether he beat his remarkably short outbound time), and Michelle and Steve dayhiked around Mono Lake. Tuffley and I drove south to the Owens Gorge, and enjoyed climbing in the warm, sunny weather --- short sleeves were okay 'til it began to cloud up around 3:00. We did five fun routes and headed back to the car after a nice day of climbing in what we agreed is a beautiful place. We met Steve and Michelle in Lee Vining and proceeded north. At the 7/11 on US 395, where the shortcut to CA 88 heads east, I dumped some of my gear in Michelle's car and Tuffley set off for Davis in my car. Michelle, Steve, and I camped at Kirkwood, in the snow beside parking lot near the base of chair 7 (Hole'N'Wall), which I'm told is allowed by the resort. Tuesday: ======== Awakened by frequent detonations for avalanche control work at 7:00, we broke camp and hit the snow after breakfast. It had also rained at Kirkwood on Monday (remarkable given the 7500'+ elevation), so the snow was hard and crunchy. There was nice powder higher up, though, and we had a good time. The drive back was uneventful, aside from a good dinner in downtown Davis, at Gardenia, a Mexican joint in the Mansion Square shopping center on E St. between 1st & 2nd. - Brian =================================================== Brian Welsch Space Sciences Lab U.C. - Berkeley http://solarmuri.ssl.berkeley.edu/~welsch/brian/ tel: (510) 642 - 9650 fax: (510) 643 - 8302 ===================================================